The Kerenyr lake was a calm place, its crystal clear waters stretching well beyond any man's vision. The watery body which had a narrow, but stable connection to the oceans via the Rawen river, was large enough to secretly follow the curvature of its celestial body. This was unknown to the most common men, the world and the continent in particular had other troubles than worrying about the true nature of its geometry and propagating this knowledge down the hierarchy of society. It was rumored that it had been a very flat joke that had triggered this conflict, but if that story indeed was true than it was more like the stupidity of its creator who had targeted it at Grom III. that was responsible. It was common sense that the entiry Grom dynasty was comprised of more or less intolerant persons who required very careful handling. However, whatever the trigger for the war between his kingdom and the neighbouring Meridin had been, the fertile ground on which its potential had been growing for long was much more simple: greed.

Marrsak was a highly militaristic society, its people under almost constant pressure to maintain a tremendously large apparatus consisting of army and a fleet of warships that had been idling around for years. While the kingdom was large, so was its population. Large numbers of solidiers meant that there was less time to seed and harvest crops or raise cattle while more food was needed to keep the troops from starving. With such a large fraction of the general population essentially doing nothing economically productive for years of their lifetime it was no surprise that the kingdom's internal welfare wasn't very advanced. The opposite of which could be said for Meridin: The land was not only what was deemed to be much more liberal, but moreover it took great benefit from the Ithjr volcano. While the fiery mountain devastated its immediate surroundings on an almost regular basis, any peasant further away could appreciate the light rain of ash fertilizing the soil. It was something Marrsak could barely have any hopes of participating in since the Hastue mountains were blocking the path of any high winds. Yet it was also said that Meridin aristocrats could be quite the arrogant bunch. As stable as the country was on the inside, together with Marrsak it formed a highly delicate arrangement. This arrangement now was fighting it out with only little regard towards any smaller neighbours. Those were faced with the difficult choice of either joining the cause of one side or remain completely isolated. Almost needless to say that the human king of Marrsak had decreed to invade the dwarven realm of Kol right away in fear of a second front stabbing into his back at a less pleasant time. By now the southernmost part of the continent was said to already have been conquered almost completely.


Two years earlier the Kerenyr lake had been populated by an abundance of small fishing boats and even larger ships carrying cargo the direct way from one coast to the other, but now with so many thousands of men already slain and rotting away on the battlefields it was not too unusual to experience the end of a clear, almost moonless night with no activity along miles of the shore at all. Bardek and Ferthyr had made camp in an abandoned hut near it -- one of the more comfortable nights the two had experienced over the last weeks since they had been caught in the conflict. Two people, one looking like a perfectly capable soldier who maybe had deserted and was on the run and the other looking like one of those wicked, unknown creatures that were said to live in the forests of Vahald , were an all too tempting target for any patrol to pick up and put into custody. Not that any of them was eager to endure that... Ferthyr was still asleep on the wooden floorboards, wings tightly wrapped around his torso as a replacement for a blanket. Bardek had been able to take what had remained of the bed, but right now it was his term to stand guard until his companion had regenerated from his shift and they could walk on.

The section of coast the hut was residing at was surrounded by hills. Their gentle slopes led down towards the lake. The grass was tall since it had been able to spread completely uncontrolled by anyone for months, making the early discovery of any approacher more difficult if one had opted for staying on the ground level around the hut. Armed men were approaching. Two were carrying a typical combination of sword and shield with the king's emblem on the latter. Another one apparently had experience using a bow and the fourth... one couldn't really tell. Unlike the others his armor did not appear to have any parts made out of metal and if it was leather it probably wasn't all too thick either. Maybe it was a person the other three were escorting, or it was a mage ? They were approaching on horses and they were doing so at a mediocre speed. So far the men didn't seem to have discovered anything that was worth their attention, but even if they decided to stay on the muddy road and not make any derivation towards the hut they'd be able to see what was happening there with ease. The small building soon was within their vision and one of the men, a rather large and broad-shouldered one with a stomach bulging underneath his armor, pointed at it...